Should I Push My Friends To Have Kids?
Usually I would mind my business, but it's hard to sit back as my friends miss the window
Since becoming a mom nine months ago, I’ve become the annoying one in the friend group telling everyone how wonderful parenthood is, and, more persuasively, how I hope that everyone who has a chance at it takes it.
I usually stop there, because it’s ultimately not my business, and, if the people I’m talking to are anything like me, being told to do something would probably make me want to do the opposite. There’s also the chance that they may already be trying, and there’s nothing worse when you’re tracking your ovulation and taking your temperature everyday hoping for that positive test, than someone checking in asking “is everything going okay?” and “why is it taking so long?”
But then, what if my off-putting, pro-baby pushiness is what gets someone to have a baby they would have regretted not having for the rest of her life if she missed the window? And I know people in that situation too. And, maybe if I become a having-kids-pusher, I’m just doing my part to balance out the scales against our ambiently anti-kids culture, with so much messaging in TV and movies and social media about how it’s all hard and miserable.